Recap: 'Justified,' Season 3, Episode 2, 'Cut Ties'

"Justified," Season 3, Episode 2, "Cut Ties," features the introduction of a new character and the return of a beloved old Elmore Leonard character played, once again, by the incomparable Carla Gugino.

Spoilers surely follow.

The main story concerns a mob hitter in the witness protection program who decides to go rogue and buy his way back into the good graces of his former bosses. He does this by capturing, torturing, and murdering a Deputy U.S. Marshal for the identity of one of the other protected witnesses and then selling that person to be killed by the people she testified against.

The miscreant makes one mistake. The man he murders is a good friend of Art Mullins, Raylan's boss. Art decides to go Vic Mackey on the guy, telling him that he has the right to remain silent so long as he can stand the pain. Having acquired the identity of the witness who has been betrayed, Art, Raylan, and a very familiar person go forth to rescue the witness and Rachel, who is in the house protecting her from two mob button men.

That familiar person is going by the name of Karen Goodall. But we and Raylan know her by her real name -- Karen Sisco -- the tough, lovely, and not to be messed with Deputy Marshal who was the star of a short running TV series on another network. Goodall is apparently her last married name. Karen is as unlucky with men as she is lucky in catching malefactors.

That includes Raylan, by the way, who is sadly for Karen back together with his ex wife Winona.

Karen has gone up in the world since we last saw her, taking down miscreants while talking cheerfully on her cell with her father, a bounty hunter. She is now an Assistant Director of the Marshals Service. She has not forgotten how to kick a little butt, though, as she proves when she and Raylan subdue some gun thugs outside a mob bosses hotel room.

In the meantime, Boyd corners Dickie in prison. Apparently his purpose is not to kill Dickie for shooting Ava, but rather to find out where Meg Bennett hid the family swag. Unfortunately it is in the keeping of a new character, a mean criminal mastermind named Limehouse, leader of an African American gang, who punctuates his threats by carving a side of beef with a knife.

Let the fun commence.

Source: Justified, Cut Ties, TVRage.com